Rating: 3 stars out of 5
When they first meet in the woods and Brad takes in Davie’s small stature and pretty-boy looks, he assumes the kid is just another runaway. As a cop, Brad has learned to recognize the signs. But Brad is already in trouble with his superiors, getting suspended for “assuming” something on another case, so now he knows better than to assume anything.
Davie, actually in his early twenties and far from being a child, escaped a horrible past and now lives each day living from hand to mouth as a drifter. Homeless and starving, he meets Brad in the woods, and despite their differences, can’t fight the immediate attraction he shares with the older man.
But with both men still trying to deal with their troubled pasts, they quickly realize it’s just not the right time to begin a long-term relationship. When they meet a year later, however, and they feel the same attraction to each other, will they be able to follow their hearts without their pasts coming back to haunt them?
Before I decide if I’m interested in a book, I normally always check the page count. I don’t like short stories, so I rule out books with less than 100 pages. But somehow I managed to overlook the page count for “The Cop and the Drifter” and only realized it was a short story when I started reading.
As with most short stories, this book lacked depth. The plot idea would have been enough for a full novel and 63 pages just weren’t enough to do it justice.
Davie has suffered horrific sexual abuse. He was raped countless times for many years and even spent several years as a sex slave. Davie tells Brad about his horrible past on the very first night they meet. Brad is a complete stranger to him and yet Davie has no trouble talking about the abuse he has suffered. That’s the first thing that bothered me. It just doesn’t seem realistic.
The author didn’t manage to make me care for Davie. His story left me cold. It all seemed very emotionless to me, as if it happened to some unimportant minor character and not one of the MCs.
Brad remained colourless as well. He’s grieving, but once again, the author didn’t manage to make me care about his pain.
The whole story felt a little hurried. Brad and Davie don’t see each other for months after that first night and yet it’s essentially love at first sight. And then they have sex again, and Davie’s history of sexual abuse doesn’t come up even once. He seemed to have made a full recovery within a few months, all without a single hour of therapy.
Overall, “The Cop and the Drifter” had enough going on to fill a full novel. But rather than give the MCs time to heal and for the romance to slowly unfold, Christiane France pressed it all into a short story that just didn’t do her ideas justice. It could have been great, but turned out just okay.
Cover: The cover by Fiona Jade is sweet, but a little generic. There are plenty of similar covers out there.
Sales Links: Loose Id LLC | ARe | Amazon
Book details:
ebook, 2nd Edition, 68 pages
Published June 28th 2016 by Loose Id (first published May 29th 2010)
Original TitleThe Cop and the Drifter
ISBN139781682521649
Edition LanguageEnglish
Note: This book was previously released by another publisher. It has been revised, lengthened and reedited in this version.
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